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Runequest Thursday #132 - More "Advanced" Sorcery!

The for the last few weeks, I have bee delving into an old favorite - Advanced Wizard - for inspiration for New Sorcery spells. There is so much cool about this book, and its parent game, The Fantasy Trip, from the early days of gaming, that I found a few more that work when suitably Runequestified. Here they are for your use, along with my Sorcery System, which works for most d100 Runequest-y games with only minor adaptation.

Note: if you want to find good pdfs of Advanced Wizard, Advanced Melee, and In the Labyrinth, Which make up the entirety of The Fatasy Trip - go to "In the Labyrinth", a fine tribute site to this great game!

These spells, are available in the current iteration of A New Sorcery, which is available as an attachment to this post.

Sleep [Man, Beast] Range – 10 Yards POW Check – Yes

Cost to Learn – 1000L

Magnitude – Variable

Time to cast – 1 Action

Duration – Instant

With a POW vs. POW success, you can induce one target of up to 15 SIZ within range to fall asleep for the duration of the spell. Those who are slept, on their next turn, may wake up on their turn with a POWx5% success (they can take a normal activation on waking). If they fail to wake, each turn, they may try again until they succeed. A sleeping target may be struck automatically (96-00% failure), at which time it will y wake up, acting immediately after the strike that wakes them (if necessary, alter their Strike Rank to reflect this).

You may devote ranks of your Manipulation Limit to increase the range, or to reduce the Wake-Up Success multiple by one, to a minimum of POWx1%, or to add another 15 SIZ to those affected, either as a single larger target, or another target of that SIZ or less.

Example:

Sivastri, with Sleep 4 and a Manipulation Limit of 5, is faced with 4 trollkin and a single troll. She is confident that the trollkin are under SIZ 15, but pretty sure that the bulky dark troll is well over that. She could devote 2 ranks of her spell to SIZ (trusting that the troll is less than SIZ 30), and try to overcome the dark troll’s POW, then reducing it’s wake Up Success, by 2 Multiples (POWx3%). But if the troll has good POW, she might withstand the spell, or wake up quickly even at POW x3%.

Instead, Sivastri elects to play it safe, and manipulates her spell to affect all four trollkin, trusting to her other abilities in dealing with the larger threat. She uses 3 ranks of her Limit to add 3 extra targets of SIZ 15 or less, leaving her one rank of the available 4 (for her Sleep 4), which she uses to deepen their slumber (reducing the Wake Up Success to POWx4%). Sivastri is counting on overcoming the trollkins’ POW (which is likely to be weaker than their mistress) and that POWx4% will be difficult enough to keep them asleep for a few rounds.

Lesser Ward [Master, Magic] Range – Special POW Check – No

Cost to Learn – 500L

Magnitude – Variable

Time to cast – 1 Action

Duration – 6 Hours

Lesser Ward is not as potent as the Ward spell, but is cheaper to learn, easier to cast and does not damage those who cross it. Thus it is often used in circumstances where the sorcerer does not want to harm those who cross the warding barrier. It also has the advantage of subtlety and convenience, since it does not require the placement of ward stone or wands if the sorcerer has a naturally defined delineation he can use in their stead. This could be a room, a doorway, even a crack in the flagstones or a line scribed in the dirt.

Many who know the spell do not bother to learn more than a single level but there are advantages to doing so. The sorcerer can ward up to one square yard (or 4 linear yards) for each point of his Manipulation Limit, which must be outlined in some physical way (as noted above). Any creature or spell that crosses the ward instantly becomes known to the caster, even if he is asleep, busy or distracted. If they intrusion was, or is, hostile, the caster will also know that much. The spell will last up to 8 hours, but the caster must remain within Manipulation Limit x5 yards throughout or the spell immediately fails.

You may spend Levels to Extend duration.

Reverse Missiles [Air, Magic] Range – Touch POW Check – No

Cost to Learn – 500L

Magnitude – Variable

Time to cast – 1 Action

Duration – 10 Rounds

Any missile (arrow, thrown axe, spear or javelin, sling stone, etc) that hits the target of the spell has a 10% chance per spell rank of missing and being revered upon the shooter or thrower of the affected missile. Missiles that hit with a Critical or Special are unaffected by Reverse Missiles, as are those enchanted with more levels of spell power than the Reverse Missiles spell in effect. So a Spear with Pierce 2 would be affected by Reverse Missile 2, but an arrow with Speedart, or a slingstone critical will not be turned. Any missile that is reversed immediately hits the one who made the attack.

This spell has no effect on non-ranged attacks or on a purely magical missile attack, like Blast or Skybolt.